


Smooth Criminal

by what_alchemy



Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: M/M, Misunderstandings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-13
Updated: 2016-03-13
Packaged: 2018-05-26 11:24:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6236764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/what_alchemy/pseuds/what_alchemy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Somehow, "freak manscaping accident" never occurred to him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Smooth Criminal

Matt had a bandage on his chest. 

Foggy really thought he and Matt had a good thing going. They had implemented a post-revelations-of-ill-advised-vigilantism honesty policy and everything. Privately, Foggy called it Dumbass Insurance as provided by Mama Nelson’s Home for Waterlogged Strays, but Matt didn’t know that. As per this policy, he dutifully called Foggy every time he went out dressed like a leather daddy’s wettest dream and again every time he came home to be counted amongst the living. He allowed Foggy to fuss over any injury more serious than a paper cut, and Foggy allowed Matt to be his friend again. Through 3am phone calls and sleepless nights, they’d rebuilt the edifice of their friendship, and Foggy was slowly, cautiously learning to be optimistic about them again. He was even coming around to the whole devil in a can of whoop ass thing. He was _trying_ , and he’d thought Matt was, too. 

But then mid-June happened, and temperatures crept toward the triple digits, and all they had at the firm were some busted old wall units in various states of disrepair. Presented with all of this, Matt did the reasonable thing—he loosened his tie and unbuttoned his collar, and then there it was: a thick pad of gauze peeking out from under his collar. 

Foggy’s heart stopped and then stumbled. When Matt looked up at him with inquisitive eyebrows, Foggy tore his gaze away and made an excuse to get into his own office and away from Matt Filthy Lying Murdock. He must have thought Foggy was a real chump, sleeping through the night this past week with no worries as his best friend potentially drowned in a pool of his own blood. Was that even possible? Matt could probably find a way. 

In his office, he stewed and ground his teeth and tried to control his breathing as he shuffled papers that really didn’t need to be shuffled. Matt could probably hear all of it. Could he hear how much his own pants were on fire? Foggy was almost tempted to ask, but he didn’t think he could look at Matt right now. He took his phone out and scrolled to his last text message to Claire. It was from ten days ago.

_Ha, you’re buying_ , it read.

_You’re the hot shot lawyer, bub, this is all on you_

He typed out a new message.

_What did he do and why didn’t you tell me?_

He erased it and tried again. 

_What did he do this time?_

Less accusatory, more commiserating. He hit send. He set his phone down. He picked it up. He scrolled through Claire’s messages, and Bess’s, and his sister’s. He pulled up Facebook and liked a few puppy photos. Some friend from college got married. He liked that, too. He put the phone in his pocket. He twiddled his thumbs. He opened up a case file and stared unseeing at some insurance forms inside. He put that down and got up to look out the window. A car horn blared. There was construction on the corner. A homeless lady took off a layer and wiped her brow with it. The streets smelled faintly of well-sunned garbage. Through all that, Foggy hoped Matt was too distracted to listen to his law partner fidgeting a room away.

Claire got back to him hours later. 

_???_

—

What was it to Foggy if Matt had issues so big the only way he could resolve them was to punish himself on the streets of Hell’s Kitchen? Any bad guy would do, as long as Matt was being pummeled? As long as Matt could rationalize it as something he had to do for other people’s safety, and fuck his own? Why did Foggy care so damn much? Maybe there was no saving some people from themselves. Foggy was old enough to know that by now. Old enough to know better. He shouldn’t be this disappointed, this _heartbroken_ , but knowing a thing didn’t seem to connect with accepting it.

He went over and over the same crap all the way home, and all through Greek food cart dinner, and all through Bob’s Burgers on Netflix. He went over it so much he began talking to himself and gesticulating madly. He went over it so much he was tired of himself, of Matt, of Daredevil, and there was nothing left for it. He was gonna go over there. He was gonna let himself into Matt’s apartment and give him a piece of his mind. 

He had his coat on and swung open the door, blood up and adrenaline pumping, only to stop short at the sight of Matt in his jamb, hand raised to knock. Foggy’s heart almost flew out of his face.

“Oh,” Matt said, mouth open and glistening. He dropped his hand. “Hey.”

“Jesus, Matt!” Foggy said, hand flying to his chest. “You scared the shit out of me!”

“Sorry, bud.” Matt leaned back, cane anchored between his feet. “I was gonna call, but I just wanted to come over anyway, and it seemed…” He floundered as Foggy’s scowl deepened. “Easier.” He cleared his throat. “Are you going out? Sorry, I should have called. I didn’t know you were busy. Sorry. Um.” That wet red mouth, opening and closing like a guppy. Matt stepped aside as if to let Foggy pass. Foggy clenched his jaw.

“I was just going to find you,” he said. Matt brightened, spine perking so he looked less like a dried leaf curled in on itself.

“Oh?” he said. “Well. Great minds.” 

“Come in if you’re coming in,” Foggy said. He backed into his apartment and held the door open. 

“Are you…”

“What?”

“You’re nervous.”

“Wow, all your super senses tell you that?” Foggy said. 

“Hey,” Matt said, stepping over the threshold and into Foggy’s space. He smiled up at him. “I’m nervous too, you know.”

Foggy held his breath even as his skittering heart did its best to occupy his stomach. Matt stepped back and swept into Foggy’s living room. 

“Let’s talk,” he said. “Properly.”

Foggy felt wrong footed, as if he’d been dropped into the middle of a conversation. In Swahili. 

“Um,” he said. “What do you want to talk about?”

Matt turned toward him, lit by the ambient light outside Foggy’s windows, and so beautiful Foggy was sure his heart was breaking. Some things, it seemed, persisted through every beating. Through lies and betrayal on top of lies and betrayal, Foggy’s pathetic devotion burned on. He wished he could logic himself out of feelings, but that hadn’t worked for the last ten years and it wasn’t gonna work right now.

“You go first,” Matt said, hands curling around the handle of his cane. “You were barreling out of here like your ass was on fire—must be important.”

“No, I—” Foggy swallowed and moved around the couch. He flung a hand out toward it in invitation. “Sit. You want a beer? You go first.”

“Fog…”

“Just humor me, all right?” Foggy needed a grip on this situation before the toxic brew of all his feelings came bubbling out of his gullet. He strode to the refrigerator and flung it open, closing his eyes and savoring the cool. After a moment, he grabbed two Blue Moons and popped the caps off. When he got back to the couch, Matt was relaxed in one corner, legs splayed, arm stretched over the back. Matt’s cane was propped against the wall near the door, and he smiled at Foggy as he took the beer from his hand.

“Thanks,” he said. 

“No worries,” Foggy said faintly. He chewed on his thumb nail until Matt told him to sit. Foggy settled into the opposite corner, the entire middle cushion empty between them. He worried the Blue Moon between his hands. He stared at the coffee table and tried to calm his heart. It was humiliating to know his body betrayed him to Matt with every blink and twitch. He even startled when Matt reached across the back of the couch and touched the tips of his fingers to Foggy’s shoulder. 

“Hey,” Matt said. “You should tell me how you want this to go.”

Foggy risked looking at him. His hair was floofed up on one side, his five o’clock shadow thought it was midnight, and he was facing Foggy’s direction with a soft look on his face. He looked dear and ridiculous, and Foggy hated how much he wanted to cuddle him into his chest until he forgot all the evils of the world existed. 

Maybe if he asked about the bandage, Matt would tell the truth and they could move forward. Maybe this was a tremor, not an earthquake. Maybe they would be fine.

Matt was stroking Foggy’s arm with his knuckles. Foggy frowned and looked up at his face. Matt’s eyebrows were raised a bit, his mouth curved gently upward. He looked as though he was encouraging Foggy to say something he really wanted to hear. Foggy’s throat went dry. He licked his lips. His eyes roved over the bit of collarbone exposed by the stretched collar of his t-shirt. No bandage in sight.

“What happened to the gauze that was there earlier?”

Matt’s brows knit together.

“Huh?”

“You had some gauze,” Foggy said. He set his beer down on the coffee table and trailed his fingertips over Matt’s collarbone. “Just here.” Foggy was amazed when he realized he could feel Matt’s breath hitch against the pads of his fingers. He snatched his hand back.

“Oh!” Matt’s eyebrows bounced back up. “I had a little grooming mishap this morning. No big deal. I put some aloe on it after I got home and it feels fine now.”

“ _Grooming?_ ”

Matt’s hand fell away from Foggy’s arm, and he shrugged. 

“I know, I should go to a professional,” he said. “But most of the time it’s fine, I swear.”

“Dude.” Foggy raised his hands, fingers splayed wide in a quelling gesture. “What are you even doing to that part of yourself? Shaving?”

“Oh, no, that would only make things worse,” Matt said, and Foggy gaped. “I wax,” Matt added, and grinned as if that answered all of Foggy’s questions.

“ _What?_ ”

Matt tilted his head.

“I wax,” he said. 

Foggy’s brain shorted out. He’d worked himself into a tizzy flopping dramatically all over Hell’s Kitchen, but sure, Matt _waxed_. Foggy’s face burned and he wished he could pretend Matt wouldn’t notice, but the blissful ignorance of those days were gone. Along with Matt’s chest hair, apparently.

“Dude, _why?_ ” 

“You must have known,” Matt said.

“I really didn’t.”

“I was shirtless around the dorm room. Constantly, Foggy!”

Foggy made some embarrassing sound halfway between a laugh and a scoff and threw his hands up. 

“I thought you were naturally smooth!” A natural adonis carved from flawless marble which of course he’d noticed, _constantly_ thank you very much, but who was asking?

“Well, that’s flattering,” Matt said.

“Matt!”

“ _What?_ ”

“Why do you do it?”

Matt turned away and took a swig of his beer.

“The hair is pretty scratchy against clothes, even silk or linen,” he said. “And cotton—it just catches and yanks _all the time_ , like you wouldn’t believe. I tried shaving, but it only gives the hair a blunt edge which itches like crazy, and I learned my lesson about Nair when I was like fifteen. Waxing makes it grow in tapered, so it’s thinner, more natural, and easier to deal with.”

Foggy stared at him, and Matt rolled his shoulders inward and slouched, mouth turned down and eyes gone big.

“Is that—” Matt cleared his throat. “Is that what you wanted to talk about?”

“You hurt yourself waxing.”

“I mean, I’m fine now.”

“What did you even do?”

An uneven little shrug.

“I misjudged the temperature.”

“Matt!”

“Look, it was a mistake and I’m not likely to make it again, okay? Why are you so worked up over this?”

“Let me guess: you _felt the air_ or whatever for the temperature instead of using an actual thermometer.”

“Yeah, okay, lesson learned,” Matt said. “I get it, okay?”

“What if you’d given yourself third-degree burns? You could have asked me, Matt!”

Matt fish-mouthed at him.

“You…want to wax me?”

“No!” Foggy threw his hands in the air. “I want your glorious rug to be free! But if you can’t let it be free, I want you not to go around burning yourself in the name of manscaping!”

The tips of Matt’s ears went red.

“It’s not about _vanity_ , Fog,” he said. 

Foggy smirked at him before taking a long draw of his beer and setting it back down.

“It’s a little bit about vanity, dude,” Foggy said. “It’s not like you wax your arms and legs, and the hair must be about the same there.”

“No, it’s…you don’t get it.”

“It’s okay, Matt, you didn’t know.”

“What? I didn’t know what?”

“You’re forgiven, you haven’t seen anything since the ’90s, it’s understandable.”

“Foggy, what are you talking about?”

“Body hair and beards, Matty!” Foggy said. “They’re in now! All the cool kids have them! So seriously, grow your shit out, stop ripping your hair out by its roots, you’ll thank me in the end.”

“Did you listen to my reasons for waxing at all?”

“Oh.” Foggy’s shoulders sagged. “Right.”

Matt’s mouth twisted downward.

“You were coming over to yell at me,” he said, voice low. “You thought I got into a scrape I didn’t tell you about and you were going to read me the riot act.”

Foggy took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Matt sat back against the armrest and turned his face away from Foggy. He tipped some beer down his throat and got up. 

“You could have just asked me, Fog,” he said. Foggy sprang to his feet after him.

“I just did,” he said. “I just did, Matt.” 

Matt paused before he reached his cane, hands curling into fists at his sides. He pressed his lips together.

“I’m gonna go,” he said after a moment. “See you at the office.”

“Why did you come here tonight, Matt?” Foggy said. “You wanted to talk, so let’s talk.”

“It doesn’t matter now.”

“No, hey, let’s get it all out there,” Foggy said, throwing his arms open. “I have trust issues the approximate size and shape of a fugitive from the law, and you have trust issues the approximate size and shape of every human being who ever let you down. So we match, right? So just say whatever you came here to say.”

The muscles in Matt’s jaw ticked. He grabbed his cane from the wall and planted it between his feet. His knuckles went white on the handle.

“Your heartbeat at the office,” he said. “Your breathing. Your—your sweat. I misinterpreted them today. Don’t worry, I won’t do it again.”

Foggy reached out and grabbed a handful of the thin t-shirt that barely hid Matt’s thunder. Matt’s lips parted as he stumbled into him. Foggy could feel Matt’s breath ghost over his mouth.

“I’m not gonna apologize for worrying about you, Murdock,” Foggy said. “But I’m sorry for not trusting you, and all I can do is promise I’m working on it. Now prove to me you’re the Devil of Hell’s Kitchen instead of the Coward of Nelson and Murdock and fucking _say what you came here to say_.”

The cane clattered to the floor as Matt seized Foggy’s face in his hands and smashed their lips together. Foggy hauled him closer, until his belly pressed into the washboard Matt called abs, until Matt moaned into his mouth as if he’d never tasted anything better than the tip of Foggy’s tongue. He wound his fingers through Foggy’s hair and kissed him deeper as Foggy’s hands slid down his sides and settled on his hips. 

“Who’s a coward now?” he said when Foggy tore his mouth away to haul in a lungful of air.

“Oh my God, Matt, did you just kiss me on a dare?”

“I endeavor to show rather than tell,” Matt said. 

“You thought I _liked_ you,” Foggy said, waggling his eyebrows. “You thought I wanted to _snuggle_ you and _kiss_ you and _put my penis_ on you.”

Matt pressed his lips together. They were wet and plump and Foggy’s blood was making an inexorable journey southward at the sight of them. Matt smoothed his hands through Foggy’s hair before curling them around the sides of his neck. 

“All somehow less embarrassing when proven factually and objectively true, so you can stop gloating any second now.”

“Okay but are you gonna judge me for my chest hair? I have, like, three, and I’m very proud of them, Matty.”

Matt’s tongue, lovely pink little thing that had _just been inside Foggy’s mouth_ , flickered out to wet his lips.

“Somehow I’ll find a way to accept them.”

Matt caught Foggy’s grin between his lips, and all of Foggy’s gloat juice evaporated into the ether.

—

The next time Matt needed a wax, Foggy booked him an appointment at the same salon that cut Foggy’s hair.

“His and his spa days, bud,” Foggy said. “We’re gonna look _awesome_.”

“What happened to ‘oh, Matt, let me do it for you?’” Matt asked, nudging him in the side with an elbow. 

“Somehow the idea of tearing your beautiful little hairs out of your body until you’re red all over just doesn’t appeal,” Foggy said.

“It’s really not that bad,” Matt said. 

“Pfft. Tell that to the pointillist painting you had on your chest last month.”

“I’m telling you, a moment’s sting is far preferable to round-the-clock itch and irritation.”

Foggy waved his hands. 

“Yeah yeah, whatever, you’re super sensitive but trawl the streets at night looking to get beat, I know. I don’t get it, but I know.”

Matt stepped up close to him and laid his palms on Foggy’s chest. 

“Why are you so obsessed with my chest hair?” he said.

Foggy lifted one shoulder and dropped it, eyes trailing down to the fuzz that had started to grow in beneath Matt’s collar.

“It’s kind of like a sexy secret, you know?”

Matt snorted and shook his head.

“No, I really don’t.”

“Just…usually body hair is all hidden, or, you know, _waxed out of existence_ , but sometimes it peeks through and I don’t know.” Foggy shrugged helplessly. “It’s sort of like a saucy wink, like it doesn’t care that it’s taunting me, and I want to sniff it and rub my face in it and pet it and maybe grab onto it—I don’t know, Matt, I don’t know.”

“Hmm.” Matt stepped closer to him, hand sliding over his chest as if absorbing the rapid beats of Foggy’s heart. “You make a convincing argument, counselor.”

“Really? I mean, yeah, obviously. I’m highly trained in arguments.”

Matt snatched his hands away and flashed Foggy a feral grin.

“Still not gonna grow it out though.”

“Aw!”

Matt shoved his hands up Foggy’s shirt and tangled his fingers into the sparse tuft of hair Foggy had cultivated lovingly between his pecs and gave it a firm yank. Foggy let out a squeak and stumbled forward.

“But I’m beginning to see the appeal,” Matt said, words catching against Foggy’s lips. Foggy whimpered, tilting his mouth toward Matt’s, but Matt pulled on his hair some more and stopped Foggy short.

“Dude, you’re playing dirty pool,” Foggy said, strangled. Foggy was powerless against the rush of blood to his dick. 

“Mr. Nelson,” Matt said. “Is there any other kind?”

**End**


End file.
